Top deals on CNET here
Storage: Partition or not partition?
Partition or not partition?
by Mindfulal2 - 2/19/09 6:59 PMI'm about to get a 1Tb western digital external hard drive.
a friend recommended to partition it, and other friends said it's not necessary!
I need it to save all my video recordings, music and pictures.
I've got other external hard drives before and never needed to partition.
my question is: why do I need to partition?
With that size..no question,
by ahtoi - 2/20/09 10:30 AM In reply to: Partition or not partition? by Mindfulal2partition. I probably would go with 250-330GB each.
RE:
by robertcooze - 2/20/09 5:13 PM In reply to: Partition or not partition? by Mindfulal2I don't think so idea of ur friend is suitable.
Definitely DO Partition!!
by Grimbles - 2/20/09 6:22 PM In reply to: Partition or not partition? by Mindfulal2Hi - I disagree entirely with your friend's advice, it is always better to partition...especially a large drive such as 1TB. There are lots of valid reasons, not the least of which is protection against substantial data loss.
I would partition into 2 or 3 depending on what your expected uses are. If you intend storing an unusually large number of similar files (e.g. MP3 or photos) or a number of very large files (e.g. videos/movies) then probably 2 would be best. If, on the other hand, you are just looking for somewhere to store or backup the usual amount of personal data I would recommend 3 partitions.
cheers....JIM
I'd Partition
by solbot - 2/20/09 6:33 PM In reply to: Partition or not partition? by Mindfulal2Especially if you will be streaming the video off of the external drive. I'd put the video on the lowest logical drive letter where there is the fastest access to the files.
The other benefit is it will speed up searches for songs or pictures if you only need to look in 250 GB vs 1000GB for the file.
Mostly it's personal preference tho.
Data-only Disk: Don't Partition.
by pepoluan - 2/20/09 6:48 PM In reply to: Partition or not partition? by Mindfulal2Since you're going to use the external HD only to store data, I recommend to *NOT* partition the HD. It's of no use, and may introduce some headache when you ran out of space on a partition.
Partitioning is recommended only for HD's which is used to store data AND programs.
Partition
by Zouch - 2/20/09 7:35 PM In reply to: Partition or not partition? by Mindfulal2On a drive this big, I would always partition. As an earlier poster suggested, partitioning is usually associated with separating data from programs or providing test partitions, which don't, of course, apply to what you want to do.
But the other reason depends on the characteristics of the files you want to store. If they are all the same, say all videocam files, all photos or all MP3, it's debatable - I'd still go for a couple of partitions to speed up search and backup but your mileage may vary. But if you were mixing say hour long videos (maybe 1.5 GB or so) with still images (say 2 or 3 MB) and you add and delete files often, you'll soon find the disk fragments and your videos will suffer as the disk searches for the next segment. If all your files are 1.5 GB, then at least if you delete one, the "hole" will be big enough to take the next one you save.
You also need to think about backup - this stuff is precious! Backing a terabyte up down a USB channel isn't exactly quick! So you might want to have two partitions, one for finished videos and the other a work volume to download your new captures and do any necessary editing before transferring the finished masterpiece to the finished library.
Yes, fragmentation might be an issue, but...
by pepoluan - 2/20/09 8:28 PM In reply to: Partition by ZouchFragmentation may be an issue, I agree. However, if I have to choose between fragmentation issue -vs- free space management issues, I'd choose fragmentation issue anytime.
It's a lot easier to defragment a fragmented drive than to shuffle files between partition, or -- God forbid -- repartitioning the drive.
As to searching: For a drive that big (and used exclusively as near-line storage), I'd rather use a good cataloging program than searching directly on the hard disk.
Finally, you implied yourself that USB channel is not that fast; why use the external HD as work volume then?
advise to partition
by ascii_pv - 2/21/09 1:01 AM In reply to: Partition or not partition? by Mindfulal2yes, its better to partition ur drive, "divide and rule".
you can independently do one drive without disturbing the other, u can put multiple boot disks and different OS, defrag seperately, more organized,...etc.
ascii
After all these sound advise we have given to you,
by ahtoi - 2/21/09 1:02 AM In reply to: Partition or not partition? by Mindfulal2you are back where you were at the start, hehe...sorry. Now tell us...who win?
Partion or not?
by avnitro - 2/21/09 1:18 AM In reply to: Partition or not partition? by Mindfulal2The best idea is to make partition. The reason? You may save your data due to any collapse of the Windows system (viruses or something like that). If you reinstall the windows on Disc C: your important data on other partitions will be save. But if you lost a hard drive, you may lost everything. Any way, I know some guys who may back up all data from the dead drive.
All the best!
Igor.
Uhm... are we talking the same thing?
by pepoluan - 2/21/09 2:12 AM In reply to: Partion or not? by avnitroIgor, the OP asked about his *external* drive, meant for storage-only.
The OS lives in his internal drive.
CMIIW.
Partition or not partition?
by Mindfulal2 - 2/21/09 12:35 PM In reply to: Partion or not? by avnitroMy first reaction to this question was not to partition, because I’d never had to do it before, and the sole idea of running out of memory because of small partitions, would really kill the whole purpose of huge memory hard drives…
But on the other hand, it is true that is easier to handle any kind of files when they’re organized in sub-groups.
So, with all the information that all of you guys so kindly provided me, I’m going to create three big partitions:
- 50% for video,
- 30% for music, and
- 20% for pictures
These are pretty much the proportional amounts of each type that I need for storage.
I do not worry for other type of data like back up files, since those are in another external hard drive already.
All of you guys have been of great help and I really appreciate it.
Therefore, I thank you very much!
Mindfulal.
P.S. thank you CNET for providing such a great service!
Ext. HD, maybe not
by Willy - 2/21/09 11:43 AM In reply to: Partition or not partition? by Mindfulal2Treat the ext. HD as you would any other ext. HD you had. No thought its ready to be used. I find conflicts when after partitioning, users forget what they did, etc., it really happens. Plus, they may introduce issues that may not crop-up until much later. However, 1tb is a huge HD and considering all the problems smaller ext. HDs have just go at it gingerly. If you checked this forum and maybe others, you'll find users with ext. HD issues that pop-up for whatever reason. I still suggest you store "real important data" on CD/DVD until the new HD proves OK.
As always partitioning is an personal choice so if you think it may suit you, decide.
tada -----Willy 
Why/Why not
by msgale - 2/21/09 1:19 PM In reply to: Ext. HD, maybe not by WillyCurrently I have two one TByte and two 500 Gbyte external USB drives for backups. They are not partitioned, never found any good reason to partition windows Disks, UNIX yes - Windows no.
| Forum legend: | |
 |
Locked thread |
 |
Moderator |
 |
CNET staff |
 |
Samsung staff |
 |
Norton Authorized Support team |
 |
AVG staff |
 |
Windows Outreach team |
 |
Dell staff |
 |
Intel staff |
